Scottish Health Minister faces pressure over waiting times

Scottish Health Minister faces pressure over waiting times

Official figures for NHS Scotland show bed blocking and waiting times are at a four-year high, as a result, Scottish Health Minister, Shona Robison has been urged to take action.

New Scottish Health Minister, Shona Robison (far right)

Scotland’s new Health Minister is under significant pressure to rescue an NHS that is ‘creaking at the seams’ following the release of figures regarding bed blocking and waiting times.

Opposition parties have taken this as an opportunity to urge Robison to take action, while claiming her predecessor, Alex Neil ignored the scale of these problems and that they ‘landed on deaf ears’.

The figures have been accompanied with the announcement that the Scottish NHS has had an increase of 23% in complaints. Robison was only appointed Health Minister last Friday, when it was also declared that the NHS budget would increase by 2.2%, to more than £12 billion.

However, Dr Brian Keighley, formerly Scotland’s most senior GP has issued a grave warning, that the NHS ‘teetering on the edge of collapse’, and needs urgent reform. He accuses the SNP ministers of ‘fiddling at the margins with short-term fixes’ despite the fact that ‘Rome is burning’.